


Through Darkness, Iron, and Fabric

by Sundial_at_Night



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Byleth's there but has one line, Crying, Fire Emblem: Three Houses Black Eagles Route, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Mentioned Blue Lions Students (Fire Emblem), Whump, Whumptober 2020, but that's also like one line, goddess im terrible at summaries, i guess i'll be self indulgent then, if that's a thing, no. 11, threats of major character death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-12
Updated: 2020-10-12
Packaged: 2021-03-08 04:47:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,753
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26966170
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sundial_at_Night/pseuds/Sundial_at_Night
Summary: Written for Whumptober 2020 No. 11 PSYCH 101 - CryingAU Crimson Flower route where Felix is recruited but not Sylvain. They meet again on the Talitean plains, and don't break the promise. What now?
Relationships: Felix Hugo Fraldarius/Sylvain Jose Gautier
Kudos: 23





	Through Darkness, Iron, and Fabric

**Author's Note:**

> Apologies in advance if this seems out of character. This is my first time writing in the fe3h fandom, and my first time trying anything even remotely not gen.

Through the dark, Felix descends stairs to the dungeons that smell of mould and rusted metal. He hasn’t changed out of his battle attire, only shed the weighty outer coat. A slight cold chilled the air, and it tasted stale without windows or passable ventilation. Candles line the wall on the right, weakly illuminating the narrow hallway. There are no guards; the entire Imperial army is out celebrating the Empire’s victory. He passes cells lined up on the left, mostly empty except for the few prisoners brought back from the Talitean Plains. There’s only one person he’s here to see.

“Sylvain,” he says, standing a good foot away from the bars that separate them. There’s enough room between the rods for their arms to pass through.

The redhead turns slowly towards him from where he’d been staring at the dark stone wall, shrouded by the shadows the candles cast. He’s out of his armour, and dressed in whatever was under that, based on the bloodstains lining the hems of the sleeves. “I knew it was you,” he says. “I can always tell.”

“Yeah?”

“Your footsteps. Everyone has a pattern.” He comes closer to Felix, who doesn’t make a move to pull away. He doesn’t want to. Doesn’t want the iron bars between them, just wants Sylvain _here,_ with him, safe. _Alive._

Felix swallows, taking a step closer, before saying what he came here to say. The words catch in his throat, but he forces them out. “She plans to execute you.”

Sylvain nods soberly, but his face crumples. “Yeah, I figured.” He brings a hand up to his forehead, and pushes his red hair back through his fingers. “Are you okay?” he asks.

“Am _I_ okay?” Felix echoes incredulously, holding onto the bars for support. His legs don’t feel steady enough to support him alone. “I’m not the one sitting in a cell!” he snaps, and immediately regrets it.

“Right. Just worried, is all.”

Of course, he’s worried about _Felix_ more than himself. That’s what got the idiot in this cell in the first place. _Honestly,_ what was he _thinking_ throwing down his weapon in the middle of the battle as soon as Felix saw him? Never mind. Clearly, he wasn’t.

_“I’m not going to fight you,” he said, expression softening, though the grime and blood covering his armour somewhat ruined the sentiment. “I won’t.”_

_“Then you’ll die,” Felix snarled back, the heat of battle still flowing through his veins._

He knew he would never be able to kill Sylvain. He couldn’t, not when it came down to it. The Empress had told him herself that his childhood friend would be there. That their weapons would clash. Felix had spent the last month working himself into a frenzy, trying to convince himself that he could and _would_ kill Sylvain if it came down to it.

He couldn’t. _Didn’t._

And now they’re both paying the price.

“Worry about yourself, idiot,” Felix says, and can’t quite put the bite into his voice.

Sylvain’s lip turns up at the corner as he leans onto the bars, forehead resting against them. They’re inches apart now, breathing the same air. “That’s what I have you for, isn’t it?”

Felix wants to punch him. How could he be so nonchalant about his own _death?_ On the other hand, he desperately wants to do something to get him _out of there._ He could find a key, take out whatever guards are hanging around. Edelgard said they’d execute the prisoners at dawn. He has time. There’s still time to do something. “Sylvain,” he breathes, not trusting his voice to stay steady even through only two syllables. His vision blurs; he doesn’t catch Sylvain’s expression. “I have to get you out of here.”

“Hey,” he says softly, and one of his hands rests on Felix’s white-knuckled grip on the iron bars, warm and calloused. “It’s okay. I’m fine.”

Felix wants to scream at him that _no, you’re not fine, this is not okay,_ and _stop pretending it is!_ He doesn’t, just reaches through the bars to grab at the front of Sylvain’s shirt, unable to pull him any closer.

 _“You’re not,”_ he chokes out because that’s all he can manage without falling apart entirely. “Syl, please, just—” _Just what? What options are left?_ He could go to Edelgard, plead his case, explain that for as long as he’s known Sylvain, all he’s wanted is a world without the burdens of the crest system. That he’d join their side against Rhea, give up his name and title, just for that. It might work. It might not.

Sylvain’s other hand rises to comb through Felix’s tangled hair in a familiar soothing gesture. “Shh,” he calms as Felix dissolves into broken sobs. “You’ll be okay, Felix. You’ll be fine.”

 _“Liar,”_ he hisses when he has enough control left to get more than half a word out at a time. “You promised… you promised we’d die together, and now you’re…” _You’re leaving me,_ he wants to say, but can’t get the words out.

“I know. I know. I’m sorry.” His fingers keep gently brushing against Felix’s scalp. “I’m so sorry.”

 _“Please,_ you can’t do this. You can’t leave me too. I’ve already lost everything to this war. Not you too.” His father passed early in the war after a wound got infected. Naturally, all of Faerghus praised his “honourable death”. It makes Felix sick to his stomach even thinking about it.

All the Blue Lions are dead. Every one of them but Felix and Sylvain. He’d seen Ingrid shot down from her Pegasus, an arrow piercing through her chest. He’d seen Dedue transform into a beast before being cut down by Imperial soldiers. He’d seen Edelgard kill Dimitri by her own hand.

And now, Sylvain. The last one left.

He feels pathetic, begging when he knows there is nothing either of them can do to prevent what’s coming. Edelgard doesn’t take prisoners. Not usually. She’d made an exception for Sylvain because she hadn’t known what to do with him, only to declare him to be killed the following morning.

It would have been kinder, Felix thinks, to end his life on the battlefield, where it would just be _over,_ instead of the torture of this _waiting._

Then again, if a chance remains—even a sliver of hope—that she’ll change her mind, Felix will take it.

Sylvain wraps both of his arms around Felix as best he can with the bars getting in the way. It’s awkward, but Felix, as much as is possible, presses his face into the fabric of Sylvain’s shirt, and lets the tears fall freely for the first time in as long as he can remember. Since…

Since _Glenn._

He yells, and the sound echoes through the prison. There aren’t any guards around to hear him. He slams his palms against the bars until he can feel bruises start to form. Sylvain doesn’t stop him, just tightens his grip on Felix’s shoulders.

 _It’s not fair,_ he thinks, that he has to lose everything over and over again. He lost Glenn, and all his friends after; Ingrid devoted herself to being like his brother, Dimitri turned into a blood-thirsty beast, and Sylvain turned to flirting with anything that breathed. Then _again_ when the Empire attacked the monastery, and the professor disappeared. They all scattered. And now... 

Now, Sylvain is the last one left, and he’s about to die like the rest of them. Who will Felix have then?

The Black Eagles make good friends, and he knows they trust them as well as he trusts them, but… He’s known Sylvain since they were children—since Felix was a little kid following around Sylvain wherever he went.

It’s not the same.

There’s also the irony of all this. That Sylvain, who hates nothing more than the crest system and what it’s done to his life, is on the wrong side of the bars. That it’s Felix who’s fighting for the Empress’s ideals.

_It’s not fair._

Sylvain should be here, fighting _with_ Felix, not against him.

_It’s not fair._

Felix sniffs, wipes away the tears with the fabric of his sleeve, and breaks away from Sylvain’s embrace. “Sorry,” he whispers after a while, and Sylvain shakes his head.

“Don’t be.” He gives one of his half-smiles, the ones he uses to put on a brave face. Felix recognizes them from casually explaining away bruises and missed play dates. “I’ll be okay,” he assures.

Felix almost wants him to be angry, to go down fighting. To pound at the bars and demand a hearing or _something._ Anything but going to his death peacefully. He lets out a long breath that shudders, air catching in his throat on invisible thorns. “Can I… can I do anything?”

Sylvain shakes his head again. “Just… come here?” he asks, and that’s all the invitation Felix needs to wrap his arms around Sylvain’s waist. Arms wrap around his shoulders again, and gently rub circles into his back. “I’ll be okay, I promise.”

Felix doesn’t believe him, but nods into his shirt anyway, cold metal brushing against his cheek.

Surprisingly, it’s Sylvain who breaks the embrace to cup Felix’s neck with his hand, thumb running over his skin. “I need you to promise me something.”

“What?” _Anything._

“Promise me you’ll live.”

“Sylvain…”

“Promise me, Felix.”

“You promised we’d die together.”

“I know. But I need you to promise me this. _Please.”_

Felix’s eyes drift to the ground, to his still muddy boots that he hasn’t had a chance to clean. He imagines living in a world without anyone left, and… _can’t._ Because, as much as they’ve left each other, Sylvain has always been a constant in his life. Always _there._

Without him…

“I promise,” he says, and still can’t imagine it, can’t dream of living in a world without Sylvain there. “I love you.”

“I love you too.” Sylvain pulls him close again, and Felix breathes in his scent, calming down for what could be seconds or minutes or hours until he hears the faint patter of footsteps coming down the dungeon stairs.

Felix pulls away, expecting a guard, but Sylvain lightly tugs on his shirt.

“It’s the professor,” he says quietly, and immediately the despair is replaced with something that tastes like hope.

He sees Byleth’s bright hair first, then the glint of the sword on their belt. They approach with a quick pace, and stop within arms reach of Felix. “You’re not going to die. Everything’s going to be fine.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! :)
> 
> (I totally copped out at the end cause i couldn't handle that much angst and no im not killing my favourites absolutely not)


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